Vacation week

Week of August 1-6, 2016, a.k.a. Vacation week

Mileage: 52 with a hill repeat workout, a set of strides, and a 20 miler - no doubles this week as I requested!  I also did 2 strength workouts and ran in 6 different states (if you count my July 31 run in South Dakota).

Monday: Cross-training Monday in Gillette, Wyoming with the hotel fitness center all to myself! I did 60 minutes on the elliptical and 40 minutes of strength training. I felt surprisingly good during this workout considering how exhausted I was when I went to bed Sunday night after touring Wind Cave, Crazy Horse, and Mount Rushmore along with driving about 4 hours!

Crazy Horse

Mount Rushmore

Mount Rushmore

Wind Cave

Entering Wyoming

Tuesday - 8.5 miles, including 8 x 0.25 mile hill repeats in Cody, Wyoming (7:29 for the whole run, quarter mile incline repeat splits were 1:25-1:29). There was a very long incline in view from our hotel balcony so I had no excuse to skip these repeats! However, the incline was very tame compared to the hill I usually run repeats on (on my usual hill, 7:15 pace is HARD). We were at over 5,000 feet elevation, so that counts for something, right? It took me a bit to get warmed up on this run, but I didn't feel that the elevation bothered me. 

Hill repeats

View from our hotel balcony where you can kind of see the incline

Wyoming wilderness

Wednesday - 10.1 miles base pace (7:32) in Livingston, Montana. I definitely toured the entire town on this run (it was about 2.2 miles from one end to the other)! I found a little trail by the river, but unfortunately it wasn't very long. I felt better than expected considering we spent all of Tuesday at Yellowstone, with many miles of walking/hiking and climbing stairs and hills in the heat. Yellowstone is beautiful and sure makes me appreciate God's creation even more!

Riverside path in Livingston

Livingston run views

We didn't pass a Montana state sign, so this had to do

Entering Yellowstone

Mudpot geyser

Upper falls, I think

Mammoth Hot Springs

Thursday - 6.1 miles base pace with 6 strides in the last mile (7:49) in Dubios, Wyoming. It was 41 degrees/feels like 34 for this run at 7,000 ft elevation! This followed another full day at Yellowstone, several hours in the car, a night at what we called The Bates Motel, dinner at a gas station, and not nearly enough sleep, so I wasn't sure if my base pace was a little slower from all of that or from the elevation (or a combination). This town of 971 had a dirt trail that ran for miles along the highway - although I'm not sure if it was actually a running trail or for farm equipment or something, but I ran it!

Yellowstone day 2 - Morning Glory pool maybe?

Fearless geyser with my nephew

I should've taken pictures of all of the names, because I don't remember many!

Someone got tired!

Old Faithful - Albani was really done for the day by this point (so was I!)

Friday - Threasy: 3.2 at 7:26 in Ogallala, Nebraska, plus a 30 minute hotel strength workout. This was my 5th state to run in this week! Our hotel didn't have a fitness center, because we chose it based in the indoor pool for the kids, but I got my strength day in with a lot of body weight and jump moves (lunge variations, plank variations, squat variations, calf raises, tuck jumps, jumping jacks, skaters, push-ups, dips, etc.). Jon was still sleeping when I did this workout in the room - miraculously. Albani stayed in her uncle and cousins' room this night. 

The kids would have been happy if we stayed in

a local hotel with a pool for our "vacation"!

Saturday - 20 miles (7:26) - because marathon training long runs know no vacation week! I ran this in Wichita (after spending Friday night at my parents' house), which I think was good for me since my next marathon is there and it's so flat compared to my routes in the Ozarks. As crazy as it sounds, I've been worried this marathon could be too flat!

I ran 8 miles solo then met Kim for 12. I felt great on this run up to mile 18, then the last 2 miles hurt, mainly because I was super hungry and my blood sugar felt wonky. They were still my fastest miles, really only thanks to Kim who I was hanging on! Overall I was very pleased with this run and my negative split, particularly coming off of vacation. When we finished, I immediately started eating the fruit I brought, and felt better quickly. I also made a recovery drink in a shaker cup (protein powder, Nuun, and water - not the tastiest but it was what I had with me), which I set on the top of my car so the Nuun could dissolve while I walked and stretched a bit. I was so zonked, I drove off and heard a crunch, then looked back and saw a cup in the road. I chalked it up to running over someone's litter, and then when I was a couple of miles down the road I reached for my recovery drink and it wasn't there - and then I connected the dots! So now I need a new shaker cup, although I was most upset that I lost my drink!  The effects of low blood sugar...

20 done

20 done 2

Sunday - 4.1 miles back at home (7:43).  I felt far better than I expected to on this run (no soreness or even stiffness), possibly because it was so short and probably because I slept 10 blissful hours the previous night.  I ran the first bit with Jon and then sped up.  It was really hard for me not to go farther, but I followed my schedule...  I have some really intense workouts coming this month so I figure I'd better take these short easy days as I have them.  I'm pretty sure I've never run over 50 miles during a vacation week, so I am pretty happy with that!